The subject matter discussed in the background section should not be assumed to be prior art merely as a result of its mention in the background section. Similarly, a problem mentioned in the background section or associated with the subject matter of the background section should not be assumed to have been previously recognized in the prior art. The subject matter in the background section merely represents different approaches, which in and of themselves may also be inventions.
Traditionally, when a request for content is received for being routed to a network device storing the requested content, a Domain Name System (DNS) has been utilized for identifying the device to which the request is to be routed. Specifically, DNS has typically been utilized for accessing content over the Internet. Unfortunately, various limitations are associated with the use of DNS when routing requests.
For example, a unique interne protocol (IP) address must be utilized for each network device storing content that is capable of being requested. Thus, a limit on a number of available IP addresses in turn limits the number of network devices to which requests may be routed. As another example, where multiple content sources store content on a single network device (e.g. share the single network device), the content sources must also share a domain name specific to that device. In addition, if one of the content sources moves their content to another network device, DNS lag due to network caches maintaining old mappings may still direct entities requesting the content to the original network device.